The Greek language underwent pronunciation changes during the Koine Greek period, from about 300 BC to 400 AD. At the beginning of the period, the pronunciation was close to Classical Greek, but at the end of the period, it was almost identical to Modern Greek.
Vowel length distinctions are important for classical poetry and drama but become less important for prose into the Patristic Age.
Overview
The most significant changes during the Koine Greek period concerned vowels: the loss of vowel length distinction, the shift of the Ancient Greek system of pitch accent to a stress accent system, and the monophthongization of diphthongs (except and ). Those changes seem widely attested from the 2nd century BC in Egyptian Greek and in the early 2nd century AD in learned Attic inscriptions. It is therefore likely that they were already common in the 2nd century BC and generalized no later than the 2nd century AD.
Another change was the frication of the second element of diphthongs and . This change likely took place after the occurrence of the vocalic changes described above. It is attested in Egyptian Greek starting from the 1st century AD and seems to have been generalized in the late Roman period.
Another series of changes was the frication of voiced stops, which is widely attested in Egyptian Greek starting from the 1st century AD but may have been generalized at a later date, possibly in the late Roman or early Byzantine period.
Yet another series of changes was the frication of aspirated voiceless stops, which is attested in several locations from the 1st century AD, but seems to have been generalized at a later date, possibly in the late Roman or early Byzantine period.
A last change (possibly related to frication of aspirated stops) is the loss of , which may have begun as soon as the late 1st century BC in Egyptian Greek, seems to have taken place no earlier than the 2nd century AD in learned Attic inscriptions, and had most probably been generalized by the late Roman times.
Controversies about reconstructions
The primary point of contention comes from the diversity of the Greek-speaking world: evidence suggests that phonological changes occurred at different times according to location or speaker background. It appears that many phonetic changes associated with the Koine period had already occurred in some varieties of Greek during the Classical period.
An opposition between learned language and vulgar language has been claimed for the corpus of Attic inscriptions. Some phonetic changes are attested in vulgar inscriptions since the end of the Classical period; still, they are not generalized until the start of the 2nd century AD in learned inscriptions. While orthographic conservatism in learned inscriptions may account for yjat, contemporary transcriptions from Greek into Latin might support the idea that it is not just orthographic conservatism but that learned speakers of Greek retained a conservative phonological system into the Roman period. On the other hand, Latin transcriptions, too, may exhibit orthographic conservatism.
Interpretation is more complex when different dating is found for similar phonetic changes in Egyptian papyri and learned Attic inscriptions. A first explanation would be dialectal differences (influence of foreign phonological systems through non-native speakers); changes would then have happened in Egyptian Greek before they were generalized in Attic. A second explanation would be that learned Attic inscriptions reflect a more learned variety of Greek than Egyptian papyri; learned speech would then have resisted changes that had been generalized in vulgar speech. A final explanation would be that the orthography in learned Attic inscriptions was artificially conservative; changes may then have been generalized no later than they are attested in Egyptian papyri. All of those explanations are plausible to some degree but would lead to different dating for the generalization of the same changes.
To sum up, there is some measure of uncertainty in dating of phonetic changes; indeed, the exact dating and the rapidity of the generalization of Koine Greek phonological changes are still matters of discussion among researchers. Orthographic variants in contemporary written sources is the most direct evidence but are not enough to date a change in every context. The testimony of grammarians and, to a lesser extent, transcriptions into foreign language are interesting because they can indicate the pronunciation that was regarded as standard by learned speakers; however, it has been argued that transcriptions may in some cases be conventional, rather than phonetic, and Greek grammarians appear to describe learned pronunciation and to ignore established vulgar pronunciation.
Sample reconstructed phonological systems Boeotian, 4th century BC
Although it belongs to the late classical period, rather than the Koine Greek period, Boeotian phonology is shown here as it prefigures several traits of later Koine phonology.
By the 4th century BC, Boeotian had monophthongized most diphthongs and featured a fricative . In contrast with Ionic-Attic and Koine, had remained a back vowel in Boeotian (written ). Long and short vowels were still distinguished.Verse texts in the Boeotian vernacular, such as the poetry of Corinna, retain vowel length.
Teodorsson argues that by 350 BC, the majority Attic dialect seemed to display similar values (except for , which was a front vowel; his reconstruction has vowel length distinctions to be neutralized and and to be merged with , like in Modern Greek), but W. Sidney Allen does not consider his conclusions to be reliable and suspects them to be an overinterpretation of the evidence.
Early monophthongization and perhaps even vowel weakening from the shift to a stress accent are also attested in Thessalian of the 3rd century BC, which suggests that several minority dialects had acquired an advanced vowel system by the early Hellenistic period.
Short vowels Front Back unrounded rounded Close Mid Open
Long vowels
Front Back unrounded rounded rounded Close , , , Close-mid , , () (?) Mid , Open-mid Open ,
The value for is attested later, in the 3rd century BC. An intermediate value of has been suggested by some, which is perhaps attested in spellings of for , which would indicate a premature loss of lip-rounding that would lead to , rather than (cf. text below).
Diphthongs (?) (?)
The diphthongs and likely retained their classical pronunciation. A single interchange with -β, indicating an early change to , is found later, in the 3rd century BC.
Stop and former stop consonants Bilabial Dental Velar voiceless voiced (?) (?) aspirated voiceless (?) (?) (?)
Fricative values for , , , and are likely but are unattested in Boeotian in the 4th century BC. A fricative value for is attested in Laconian in the late 5th century BC from spellings with , including in some plays by Aristophanes. also appears to have become a fricative in 6th-century BC Elean (see discussion on consonants below). Additionally, as noted above, a single example of for is found a century later.
Other consonants Nasals (~ ) Liquids (~ ?) () Sibilant , Aspirate(?) (?)
No reference has been found on the status of the aspirate in Boeotian during this period.
Accentuation The tonal accent system of Ancient Greek probably remained relevant.
Sample phonetic transcription The following text, a Hellenistic Boeotian inscription, is rendered in a reconstructed pronunciation that reflects regional phonological developments. Monophthongization and vowel raising are clearly seen in the specialized Boeotian orthography, which uses η for αι, ει for η and ηι (ῃ) and ω for ωι (ῳ). There is also a spelling of ει for οι, indicating an early loss of lip-rounding resulting in , not , which allows the inference that at this stage, οι became , not . It is possible that in vulgar Attic, the > shift had already occurred in the 4th century BC but was resisted in Koine by conservative interference. Also notable is the continued use of the digamma ϝ for .
Learned pronunciation, 4th century BC to 2nd century AD Until the beginning of Roman times, some learned speakers may have retained a conservative pronunciation that preserved many traits of the Ancient Greek phonological system. For example, well into the Roman period, there are indications from musical inscriptions and grammarians such as Velius Longus and Philostratus of the preservation of the vowel length and the pitch accent. More educated speakers may have engaged in code-switching between the popular Koine variety in everyday speech and the archaizing pronunciation in formal, poetic or musical settings. However, the learned pronunciation appears to have disappeared by the 2nd century AD, even in Attic official inscriptions.Cf. a spelling of υ for οι on an official inscription, noted in
The "learned pronunciation" described here is mostly pre-Koine Attic.
Short vowels Front Back unrounded rounded rounded Close Mid Open
Long vowels Front Back unrounded rounded Close , /_C or #, () , () Close-mid or Mid , /_V, () Open
The pseudo-diphthong was confused with in manuscripts except before a vowel, when it was confused with , and so it probably retained its ancient value there.Note that /_C stands for pre-consonantal, /_V for pre-vocalic contexts and /_# for a word boundary. See A monophthongal pronunciation of as is written in parentheses as a dialectal trait of beginning in the late classical period. In addition, probably first lost its final element and merged with but was later raised to (as seen in alternations between spellings of / for the second-person singular middle ending). Both pronunciations are given as possible dialectal variants.Cf. differences in reconstructions of Attic versus Egyptian, .
Diphthongs Front offglide Back offglide () (Long first element)
Long first element diphthongs are written in parentheses because they were gradually monophthongized starting from the classical period; Dionysius of Halicarnassus prescribes them as a "correct" pronunciation, indicating that the diphthongs were no longer pronounced in natural speech. By the 1st century BC, monophthongization had been completed (see diachronic description below for more details).
Stop consonants Bilabial Dental Velar voiceless voiced aspirated voiceless
Ancient grammarians and transcriptions suggest that the voiced and aspirated stop consonants were retained until the beginning of the Roman period. The voiced stops probably became fricatives before the voiceless aspirates.
Other consonants Nasals () Liquids (~ ?) () Sibilant , Aspirate
Some scholars regard as an allophone of , others as a separate phoneme, and so it is put in parentheses.
The exact sound that represented is a matter of discussion, but it should probably be regarded as an allophone of , written .
denotes a geminate between vowels.
Accentuation Learned speech retained the tonal accent system of Ancient Greek.
Sample phonetic transcription The following excerpt is part of a decree of the Roman Senate to the town of Thisbae in Boeotia in 170 BC. It was transcribed with a conservative variety of Koine in the early Roman period. The transcription shows partial (pre-consonantal/word-final) raising of and to , the retention of the pitch accent, and the retention of word-initial (the rough breathing).
Egyptian Greek, mid-2nd century BC By around 150 BC, Egyptian Greek had monophthongized its diphthongs and lost the distinction in vowel length.
Vowels Front Back unrounded rounded rounded Close , /_C or #, Close-mid or Near-close (?) /_V, (?), Mid , , , Open ,